Unfortunately, I can't really recall what this tasted like fresh, so I can't compare it to this 12 year old tin. I'm not sure if it dumbed down excessively with age, but the word "characterless" that was used by another reviewer is very apt. The topping was very faint and mildly sweet. The color was of the darker brown variety. No taste of the typical orientals here - just a mildly sweet virginia with good body from the various tobaccos. I could not discern any particular flavors with this one. It was mild and cool smoking with no hint of heat or bite. This would be a good one for someone that just wanted to smoke a pipe and didn't much care what went into it. I can certainly understand why this blend didn't make a comeback with many of the other Dunhill blends. Aside from the gross omission of Elizabethan, the new producer did a good job of burying the dead ones.

If you come across a tin of this and it's cheap and you're curious, by all means satisfy your curiousity. If the seller feels they have an aged classic and charges accordinly, take a pass.

Some years ago I picked up five tins of Ready Rubbed from the duty-free shop in Dubai airport. I had never seen this particular Dunhill before, and the tin description piqued my curiosity: was this going to be a Dunhill rival to Samuel Gawith products? I am afraid the smoke was disappointing. There was neither the Dunhill strength nor the Dunhill taste. Utterly unmemorable, so much so that every two to three years I would open a tin just to try and remember what it was like. The last tin was opened recently and did nothing to change my opinion of the mixture. There is nothing obnoxious about the tobacco, but if I was to choose one word to describe it, the word would be `characterless`.

This is another of my ebay acquisitions as I was not able to find this blend in the U.S. I suppose it is one of the Dunhill blends not presently being imported.

This did not ring my chimes, but was at least worthy of a couple of bowls. The smell in the tin was sort of a honey/licorice combination, but at the match, I could detect very little casing and a mostly "tobacco" taste, which I appreciated. The blend smoked very cool, and I detected what I sure thought to be the taste of cigar leaf mixed in there with the virginias and whatever else Dunhill tossed in.

I found the tobacco to be a bit rough at the back of my throat - very similiar to the effect I received when smoking Dunhill's Light Flake. The cut of the blend was ribbon, but each strand was chunkier than many rubbed out virginias.

For a change of pace, or, just something a little different, you might like this blend. It did have a nice nicotine level, and again, a true tobacco taste. As for me, I do not plan on planting this particular weed in another of my pipes!

Tin Aroma: I don?t know how to describe this. It is without question a tobacco aroma, but there is also a top note here. It is a sweetish, berry/citrus aroma. It is an aroma I associate with Danish tobacco blends.

Appearance: Dark tobaccos, mostly medium cuts, but some long ribbons here as well. It needs a little drying out before smoking. The Cavendish is the most obvious component.

Initial flavor: The first thing I tasted when the flame touched the leaf was a Virginia-type astringent sweetness, but that was quickly followed by the dark, rich taste of the other tobaccos. The topping enhances this dark flavor without being overwhelming. Overall, this is a mild but very interesting mixture.

Mid bowl: I wish I could be more specific about just what the taste is here. It has many Virginia-style qualities, including an obvious need to smoke slowly, but there is also something more here. I can only assume that it comes from the smoke curing of some of the tobaccos included in the mix. Oddly enough, there is nothing that I would call ?smoky? about the flavor. The tobacco flavor becomes richer as the bowl burns down. The topping plays a part, but is not intrusive. This is a very slow burning tobacco. I have had to re-light several times.

Finish: Toward the bottom of the bowl, the flavor of the topping disappears almost completely, leaving a definite Virginia-and-Cavendish flavor. The dark notes are still very evident as this bowl winds down. There is some sizzling at the bottom of the bowl. I probably didn?t let this dry out enough. The tobacco burns down to a small amount of dark gray ash, and leaves a pleasant after-taste.

Summary: This is a mild-but-flavorful tobacco. The nicotine content seems to be in the medium-to-high range. Unlike most aromatics, the tobacco flavor is full throughout the bowl. I had to re-light several times in the first half, but I finally got a good burn going. I enjoy a small bowl of this occasionally, and would recommend it to beginners and to die-hard Virginia smokers as a change-of-pace.

Mature, flue cured leaf from the USA, Brazil and Africa is blended with sun cured and smokey fired tobaccos from Indonesia and India. Pressed with Cavendish to produce a rich smoke. This is what the Dunhill description says, and some comments on ASP were rather positive: since this tobacco isn't available in Italy anymore and a local tobacconist still carried 5 tins of it, I decided I might give it a try before it was too late. I must say this is my first disappointment with Dunhill. The moisture content in the tin was OK in spite of it being rather old (that's why I prefer tins to pouches), and some leaves had little crystals of sugar: I expected a nice aged and mellowed blend! Mellow it is, but it is also almost non-existant! This stuff has very little taste, and what little it has comes in a very monochromatic way. It may remind me a bit of some of my favorite Virginia flakes (but this one is fully rubbed out), but it has 100 times less flavor and sweetness in comparison. It is an extremely mild, cool, and slow smoke: I can't make this stuff smoke hot and nasty, neither make it bite the tongue and the throat. It burns rather wet, though. It is supposed to be slightly aromatic, but the flavoring (rather soapy - also the tin smell is like scented soap - but almost imperceptible) is as light and subtle as the taste of the tobacco itself. A positive note is that the room aroma is very light and pleasant, too. If you like hot air, or if you are too wimpy to try some real man's stuff, this might be your tobacco. For me, it's a complete waste of time and money!

This is a nice everyday smoke, nothing that really stands out. As far as English tobacco goes, I consider it a bit unusual. It is mildly sweetened and has a mild fruity flavor, but also a bit of tobacco body. It is not a heavy blend in terms of strength; it is somewhat mild for this style of English tobacco.

The dominant flavor is a flue-cured tobacco zest and sweetness with a bit of a undercurrent of darker tobacco flavor, and there is just a hint of a cigar-like flavor sometimes. The top casing is often present, and again it's a citrus/berry flavor. The overall flavor for this blend is somewhat on the mild side but it's not devoid of flavor altogether.

First of all, this tobacco is absolutely unsmokeable when first opened. It?s too moist and worse, the casing kicks you like a cheap vodka hangover. I bought a tin of it and was horrified at the frou-frou, Smurf-berry casing that attacked me when I first opened it. I was shocked. I was so disappointed. I was almost insulted ? Dunhill, makers of two of the greatest blends of all time (Nightcap and 965), had made resorted to making lollypops, I thought. Still, something in me whispered, "Don't write off old Alfred so easily." I left it out to air for a week or more, then tried it again. Better, but still nothing memorable: a nice, sweet Cavendish with a noticeable Virginia presence. I closed it up and forgot about it.

Time passed.

Rummaging in the tobacco cupboard for something light and non-English, I found the long-lost tin of Ready Rubbed. Nothing special the first time, I thought, but I?ll give it a shot. I took the lid off only to discover I hadn?t adequately closed it. The leaf was as dry as could be, and the odor of the casing had all but disappeared. Maybe, I thought. . .

I loaded up a medium Sasieni and struck a match.

Flame met leaf and, to my shock and pleasure, I was in heaven. I sat in a deep armchair and listened closely to the blend, and I knew, by some quark, I?d finally found it: a truly amazing aromatic. A Cavendish aromatic with a true Virginia base, a subdued topping, rounded off with a late whisper of surprising Turkish.

And it's the Turkish that keeps this, an aromatic, in my, generally an English smoker's, semi-regular rotation. It's there. It's a quiet note. But when you concentrate on it, its sharp tickle makes this a memorable blend ? good for a lazy morning with a cup of tea or mid-afternoon break from heavier blends.

Now, I buy a tin (when I can find it ? it's increasingly scarce here in Poland), pop it open, break it up a bit, and don't touch it for at least three weeks, though a full month or more produces best results. Sounds like an exaggeration ? overkill, even. But it's worth it.

It's not available in the States, but if you have a tin of it from E-bay and were initially a little disappointed it in, air the hell out of it and give it another shot.